


Hanging by a thread

by CorranBlue



Series: Lost and Found [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alpha 17 is buir to the command class, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst and Feels, Developing Friendships, Hurt/Comfort, Learning to trust, Lost Items Soulmates, M/M, Soulmates are gifts from the force
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-16
Updated: 2020-12-17
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:28:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28116195
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CorranBlue/pseuds/CorranBlue
Summary: In a galaxy far far away, soulmates are sacred and gifts from the Force. The phenomena has been studied for eons, but still no one quite understands why or how the Force connects people, all they know if that when your soulmate loses an item, it ends up beside you. The Force works in mysterious ways, and as one clone commander is about to find out, nothing is as easy or straightforward as it seems.
Relationships: CC-2224 | Cody & Obi-Wan Kenobi, CC-2224 | Cody/Obi-Wan Kenobi, Obi-Wan Kenobi & Quinlan Vos
Series: Lost and Found [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2059770
Comments: 27
Kudos: 265





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Well, here it is! The beginning of the soulmate au! I know I said I would wait to post until I finished the whole thing, but come on. It's going to take me a while 😂 might as well share what I've got. I hope you enjoy :)

Obi-Wan had never regretted his lack of soulmate items, even as he watched crèche-mate after crèche-mate find their partners. He never once felt the need to search endlessly like his friend Quinlan Vos. He trusted the Force, and knew that if there was a soulmate waiting for him, he would meet them when the time was right. He also knew that if he had no soulmate, he was perfectly content as he was. Obi-Wan didn’t need a partner to “complete him,” he was whole as he was. His identity and his happiness weren’t wrapped up in another being, though he saw no problem with his crèche-mates and fellow Jedi immersing themselves in the hunt. 

So when Obi-Wan missed all the signs, all the warnings and clues, he could be forgiven for neglecting to recognize them for what they were-gifts from the Force. 

Obi-Wan sighed as he sat down with Quinlan for the thousandth time to “just go over the items one more time, maybe this will be the moment!” It was sure to be a long night. 

The sheer volume of items Quinlan had managed to find was astounding considering the lack of identifying markers. Not one item they found could be traced to any of the known systems. One time he had found a flimsi flyer for a Coruscant fish market, which sparked a hysterical goose chase, but in the end it turned out that it had been left on his table by his former Padawan. 

“Alright, have you at least found anything useful since last time?” He scrubbed a hand over his face and landed on his beard, trying to analyze the familiar items before him. 

A strange wire hook, seemingly handmade. A square of red fabric that was worn down so much it was almost see through. Dozens of pencils, and one stylus (the stylus had been a rather encouraging find, they were able to track the factory it had been produced in, but as there were no serial numbers on such cheap goods, there was no way to tell where it had ended up). A stretched out hair band, which Quinlan was frighteningly sure didn’t belong directly to his soulmate, but rather was adjacent to him somehow (and yes, Quinlan was sure his soulmate was a man, and he could not be persuaded to think otherwise, regardless of his attraction to multiple genders). All of these items and so many more. 

Quinlan couldn’t be sure, but he thought his soulmate lived near an ocean, or maybe a salty lake. The items first smelt like saltwater when he found them, though the scent soon faded. 

There were two things to note about the items. First, they had only begun appearing roughly eight years ago. So either his soulmate had been studiously avoiding losing things, or he hadn’t had things to lose until then. Both were sobering thoughts. The second thing to note was a function of the Force. See, the items Quinlan found had been stripped of all their echoes. A man like Quinlan Vos, skilled Jedi Master with the gift of retrocognition, should be able to find his mate at the first lost item. But the items carried no imprints on them but the physical. 

“Nothing new, but we gotta be close to finding something! I mean, Obi-Wan, we’ve been searching for years now! He’s close, I can feel it.”

Obi-Wan sighed again as he slipped into a light meditation on the items before him. After a few moments of hesitation, Quinlan slipped in to join him. As always, meditating with his dear friend was a bit more turbulent than when he was on his own (still more stable than with his own padawan), but he relished the close contact of another Force-sensitive too much to let the dark-tinged pulses deter him. 

After some time, he felt a stirring of amusement. He sent a questioning thought toward Quinlan, but received the perception of a head shake back at him. If the emotion wasn’t coming from either of them, that meant…

_ Soon-not-yet-coming-patience-child- _ **_patience_ ** . 

Regardless of the message, when the Force communicated to him it felt as though he were bathing in light, as if he could raise up his arms and beams of pure, blinding white would stream down his body. 

Obi-Wan couldn’t stop himself from reaching out reverently to caress the wave that had spoken, and felt a jolt that reached to his center when he realized the wave was curling around him now. Quinlan’s message had been delivered it seemed, and now it was Obi-Wans turn. 

_ Coming-coming-coming _ . 

_ Me as well?  _ He questioned, and felt a thrum of affirmation wash over him. 

_ Steady-steady-so-steady _ . He breathed a sigh of relief. He wasn’t sure he could handle another turbulent relationship, Anakin was trying enough.

_ Loyal-for-you-quiet-calm-steady _ . 

With a final whisper of love, the Force ended its communication with them and the two Jedi pulled back into their bodies. 

“I suppose you just need to be patient, my dear friend,” he mused as he turned the thought of his having a soulmate after all around in his mind. 

“What a load of bantha-poodoo,” Quinlan sailed at the floor, showing exactly none of the reverence or joy Obi-Wan felt after such a rare and direct communication with the Force. “I’m patient, so patient. In fact, I’m so patient, I might as well not even be made to wait. It’s useless. What am I supposed to learn anyway?”

“I imagine you are expected to calm down a bit. The Force is dampening your ability to find him for a reason. Maybe he isn’t ready to be found yet,” he stood up and cracked his back. “Quinlan, don’t worry so much. You’re fated to meet, so just calm down a bit. And stop leaving gloves everywhere, it’s a waste of perfectly good-and  _ essential _ might I add-clothing. One day you’re going to need those gloves, and you’ll wish you hadn’t tossed so many away.”

“Aw, don’t be like that,” Quinlan scoffed and spread himself out on his floor. 

“Like what? Practical?”

“ _ Sensible _ , I can’t argue with you. You’re impossible,” Quinlan moved as if he were trying to make a dust-man in the floor (which was certainly dirty enough for it, Quinlan really needed to let the cleaning droids in more often). “Arguing is like, half my personality.”

“Well, at least you admit it. But really, you don’t want the wrath of Quartermaster Walle’e to fall on you,” Obi-Wan bent over to place all the items back in the small box, but paused when Quinlan held out his hand. Obi-Wan felt affection bloom in his chest as he pressed the red square into his hand and then watched as his friend absentmindedly fiddled with it. 

“Stay the night?” Quinlan looked up with hopeful eyes and Obi-Wan internally resigned himself to being cuddled half to death. 

“Alright, but I need to be up early tomorrow, I have a lead to follow up on.” 

They fell asleep on top of the covers, with Obi-Wan’s face squished against Quinlan’s chest as the kiffar held him close. Obi-Wan always slept better when he was with a friend, a quirk his late Master had tried-and failed-to cure him of. 

When morning arrived, he found it harder than he’d have liked to leave his sleeping friend. He quickly returned to his own rooms, packed for his journey, and boarded the cold starfighter that had become his own. 

As he winked into hyperspace, he knew that whatever he was to find on Kamino would change everything. Part of him wanted to turn back and pretend he had never found a lead on the dart, but something pushed him forward. Whatever he found on the water world Kamino, he would deal with it like the Jedi he was. 

He braved the storm and the rain and found his way inside to where a curious being was waiting for him. Obi-Wan was berating himself for not putting up his hood before he stepped out of his ship, and resigned himself to dripping water all over. Although, he reasoned with himself as he took in his surroundings, that was surely to be expected on a water planet.

"Master Jedi," they said with a graceful bow of their long, pale neck. "The Prime Minister is waiting for you."


	2. Chapter One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we're off! Thanks so much to everyone for leaving kudos and comments on the first chapter, it brought me a lot of joy seeing how excited some of you are 😭 Since I already had this written, I decided why make you wait for the first chapter? So here we are, on Kamino, please enjoy

The first time it happened CC-2224 was three standard. He was sitting on his bunk, alone and in the dark, when an object appeared next to him on the bed. Now, Cody might have been training his whole life to work with Jedi, who work with the Force, but he knew almost nothing about these mysterious beings or the powers they possessed. The young cadet knew even less about the source of the Jedi’s powers. 

And unsurprisingly, the Kaminoans decided that the clones needn’t be taught anything about soulmates. After all, they were simply cannon fodder, made to be replaceable. One clone didn’t even amount to a single cog in the great wheel that was (or would be) the Grand Army of the Republic. 

So when the pencil appeared next to him, he didn’t think it odd. He figured one of his brothers forgot it in his room when they were studying. After all, things didn’t just appear out of nowhere, right?

The next day he placed the pencil in the holder at the main library and went on his merry way. 

The second time it happened, Kote was seven. He found a sock on the floor of his room, made from non-standard materials. He assumed it was one of the trainers’ and threw it away. That would show them to leave their junk around. 

When Cody began training under Alpha 17, he was exposed to a much wider world. The Alpha class had been trained personally by Fett himself. Prime passed on culture to his copies, stories and legends from Manda’yaim and beyond. The Alpha’s considered it their duty to pass on their knowledge to their younger brothers in turn, and so it was that Cody learned about soulmates.

~

Cody sank to one knee and pivoted around, firing three shots in quick succession. Satisfied that he had hit all his targets, he stood and began advancing. In no time he managed to secure the post and wave his squad in. They stood around the main computer suppressing grins and words of encouragement as their surroundings faded into blue light, and they were on Kamino once again. 

“CC-2224, commendable performance. You managed to complete your primary and secondary goals while maintaining control of your squad. No casualties or deaths, exactly what we want to see. Troopers, you are dismissed for the day,” the scientist waved his hand and left the room, leaving the brothers to a small moment of relief and pride. As the doors whooshed shut behind the man, the men huddled together, slapping each other's backs and ripping their helmets off. 

Cody had a few tears in his eyes as he surveyed his squad, his vode. The commanders would all be split up when the Jedi came knocking, but for now they were together. And he would cherish every moment.

“Hey, think 17 is busy?” Bly’s voice piped up, and all eyes turned to him. 

Wolffe rolled his eyes and thumped Bly on the back. “Why don’t you go ask buir to adopt you already.”

“Yeah, I’m sure he wouldn’t mind!”

“Do it, commander.”

“Set a good example for your brothers, open up a little!”

“Aw, come on!” Bly’s plaintive voice rose above the lighthearted jesting of his brothers. 

“What else are we going to do? It’s not like the Kaminoans want us doing anything,” Fox glanced at Cody. “And last I checked, we don’t exactly have the best record for staying out of trouble on our own.”

Grey and Ponds gave each other a look before nodding and set off towards the door, the rest following close behind. Cody fondly shook his head as he walked a few paces behind, idly wondering what Alpha would tell them today, if anything. They already knew all the chants, Mandalorian customs, little quirks about Jango. Alpha didn’t have much else to tell at this point, or at least that’s what he was so fond of telling them.

They were in luck, as Alpha 17 was on planet and not busy (and most importantly in a good mood). He welcomed his little brothers in with a dramatic wave of his hand and let everyone settle down before talking. 

Grey and Ponds were leaning against each other in the corner, Bly was sitting with his back to Wolffe’s chest and his legs slung over Grey’s, Greer was on his stomach using their legs as a pillow, and Cody had Fox tucked up against his chest. When they finally stopped shifting around, they looked up at Alpha 17 expectantly. He sighed and crossed his arms in fake exasperation. 

“What am I going to do with you boys?” He sat down onto his chair and tipped back just enough so he could still see their faces. “I suppose you want a story?” 

He seemed to be weighing different options in his mind, shaking his head at some and grunting at others. Just when it seemed like they were going to get a repeat, his eyes darkened and he set both feet on the floor. He leaned his elbows against his knees and looked at them one at a time. 

“I think it’s time to tell you about the jetiise, considering you’re going to be working with them at some point.”

Fox gave an excited wriggle against Cody, who simply smiled and pushed his hand through Fox’s hair. Cody knew his vod’ika was looking forward to having a Jedi CO, more than the others. 

“So the first thing you need to know is that the jettise are absolutely crazy, every single one of them,” the command class exchanged confused glances. “They will push your buttons, test your limits, and make you wish you had a direct comm line to their heads, because their logic won’t make sense to you,” 17 closed his eyes for a second. “But. The Jedi are powerful beings with iron clad self control, capable of great destruction. It’s going to be your job to reign them in and keep them focused.”

Cody closed his eyes and tried to picture a Jedi. He imagined they would be tall and intimidating, probably shredded. He thought they might have snarls, like Wolffe when he was mad, or perhaps glowers like Ponds. He’d heard they wore robes, so those probably spun out as they turned. He wondered if his Jedi would like him…

As 17 spun his tales about the Jedi, Cody’s mind drifted off even as he reminded himself this was crucial information. All he could think about was whether his Jedi would like him or not. He couldn’t imagine such a powerful being liking him, a clone. But maybe, because he was made for them, maybe he would get lucky. 

At that exact moment, a crystal appeared on his leg. “What’s that?” Fox asked immediately, pointing at the object. 

“Oh,” Cody stared at it. “I don’t know?”

17 had stopped talking and looked dangerously focused on Cody as the commander-in-training picked up the shard, inspecting it. 

“Looks like a rock or something, I don’t know,” Cody nervously glanced up at 17, who hadn’t looked away for a second. “Did you drop this?”

“No, Cody, I didn’t drop that,” he spoke slowly, and the cadets felt their muscles tighten with apprehension.

Cody squinted up at the older clone, only to find the little flicker in his jaw that meant he was holding down a smile. What’s he smiling about?

“I think I need to have a talk with little Kote here, the rest of you go back to the barracks. No complaining!” He cut off Wolfe’s grumbles and Fox’s pout and ushered his brothers out the door. Grey turned to give him a confused look before he too was shoved out, leaving just Cody and 17. 

“Did I do something wrong?” Cody clasped the stone so hard in his hand he knew it would leave marks. He swallowed and stood to face his ori’vod. 

“No, Kot’ika, you didn’t do anything wrong,” 17 looked at the nine year old cadet, and Cody stared back. He still wasn’t used to being the same height as 17. He knew objectively that they were clones of the same man, but...well. 

“There’s something you need to know. Many of your vode have already come to me, but you...well I just thought you didn’t have one. It’s not uncommon.”

“One what?” Cody straightened his shoulders and looked the alpha clone in the eyes. 

There was a tense moment before the older clone responded. “Can I see it?” Cody startled and fought an unexpected wave of protectiveness. Why would he want to see it? 

He wanted to say yes, but he needed answers first. “What’s going on, buir?” Cody cringed at the slip-up, but noticed the way 17’s eyes lit up. 

“Kot’ika, have you heard your brothers talking about soulmates?” Cody shook his head. 

“Well, it’s-here, sit,” he led Cody over to the bed and forced him to sit, pushing down on Cody’s already broad and well-muscled shoulders. “So the Force ‘works in mysterious ways’ as the trainers say. One of those ‘things’ is soulmates.”

Theoretically Cody could piece together what that meant, but he still had no idea what that meant for him. He raised an eyebrow and waited. 

“Kark, you look just like Jango when you do that. Okay, so, soulmates. Basically how it works is you lose something, your soulmate finds it beside them and the same goes for them. If they lose something…”

“I find it,” Cody looked down at the crystal in his hand. “But, we’re clones? Does that mean we have the same soulmate?”

Alpha-17 shook his head gently and sat beside him. “Cody, we’re unique.” He placed a firm hand on Cody’s shoulder as he started to shake his head. 

“That osik the trainers and longnecks spout at you is just that-osik. We are individuals, Cody. Every one of us is different and unique and special. For those vode gifted with a soulmate, they each have their own partner waiting for them,” 17 smiled and squeezed his shoulder. “You’re your own man.”

“But I’m not, not really.”

Cody stared into his ori’vod’s dark eyes, mirroring the same conflicted emotion he always felt. 

“Anyways,” Alpha cleared his throat. “Back to soulmates. You will keep finding everything they lose, without fail, until one of you is dead. If you want, you could probably find them if you kept everything, but that’s asking for trouble here.”

Cody looked down at the crystal, a delicate blue shard. 

"Jango told us soulmates were two halves of the perfect team. Warriors who fought together were to be feared," 17's voice was gentle. "Not much softens the old fool, but the look on his face when he described soulbonds, stars. Let's get one thing right, cadet, this is a gift. A dangerous one, but a gift nonetheless."

“The Kaminiise aren’t exactly okay with their products showing inconsistencies. You know this. I’m not saying you’ll get decommissioned, you’re too high on the ladder for that. But you have to play it smart,” Alpha-17 looked to the wall for a moment wearing a pensive expression. “Cody, first and foremost you need to protect yourself and your siblings.”

“You have my silence,” Cody tapped a fist to his chest to seal the pact. “So this would be something he-they lost, but what is it?”

Alpha shook his head. “Your guess is as good as mine, ad.”

Cody hummed thoughtfully. 

“When Bly came to me, he was full of questions, he almost didn’t stop talking once for the two hours,” he chuckled fondly and bumped their shoulders together. “Anything you want to know? You can ask me whatever you want.”

Cody shook his head. What did it matter? He was going to fight and likely die in the coming war anyway. His soulmate, whoever h-they were, was better off without him. 

But when he was back in his tube and laying in complete darkness, he couldn’t shut off his mind. He pulled the crystal out of his pocket and carefully turned it over in his hands, and in the dark he noticed something he hadn’t before. It was shining a gentle blue hue. Not enough to see by, but enough to be seen. 

Cody sighed and drifted off to the image of a gentle blue gaze staring back at him. 

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed the beginning of a monster! Feel free to come say hi on tumblr (@corranblue) I promise I don't bite :)  
> This fic is mostly going to be from Cody's perspective if I remember right, but I wanted to start off with some Obi-Wan, since we won't be seeing him for a while :)


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